


Præy

by anniesburg



Category: Far Cry 5
Genre: Affairs, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Dirty Talk, Doomed Relationship, F/M, Kissing, Light Asphyxiation, Masturbation, More tba. - Freeform, Pre-and-During Canon, Sex Over the Radio, Sneaking Around, Table Sex, Vaginal Fingering
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-14
Updated: 2019-07-14
Packaged: 2020-06-27 23:02:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19799569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anniesburg/pseuds/anniesburg
Summary: A tell-all exposé concerning waitress-turned-deputy Jeanann Leahy and her numerous illicit activities spanning nearly twenty years in Hope County, Montana.





	Præy

**Author's Note:**

> there's probably going to be four chapters to this, chronicling a different relationship/sexual partner jeanann's had at two parallel points in time.

__

_2012_

The tick-tock of the second hand traipses through the near-empty Aubrey’s Diner. Jeanann’s killing time, sweeping the floor is busywork. All of it’s to keep her mind off the clock that bleeds minutes, closing time draws nearer.

He doesn’t always come. Some nights, she hears cars race over the highway like hummingbirds and none pull off the paved road. No one visits her. 

But even the virtuous can’t keep their distance. A man’s heart is simple, fragile. His wants, constantly, new entanglements. 

Jeanann keeps sweeping, even as she hears tires squealing on asphalt somewhere distant to her left. Even as those tires slow, stop. Even as she hears shoes crunching on gravel from the open window. 

Then, she can’t wait any longer. A quick, upward glance into the night confirms it. She’s to receive a guest. 

He’s outside his car, peering into the diner window. At least he doesn’t flash the high beams into her eyes this time, she swears her vision’s still blotchy. Her gaze drops to the black-and-white diamonds she stands on. Cheap linoleum still needs cleaning, he can wait or he can come inside. 

The man has no qualms with coming to get her. He swung by during open hours a couple times for crappy coffee and cherry pie. He talked to her, it might’ve been sweet. Jeanann doesn’t really remember much about what he said, just how he looked at her. 

There’s never been a soul so enticing as John Seed. Everything about him’s still inviting, she notes as he locks his car and saunters from hood to door. He knocks on the window, giving a pointed look at the sign saying the diner’s shut down for the night. 

It’s a ruse, he knows she’d never lock him out. But Jeanann abandons her broom, leaning it against the bar and going to John. He’s a mistake, a glaring and handsome one, but she lets him in. 

The bell chimes above her head and her smile is decidedly bright. She’s excited, broadcasting it to him and a way John finds refreshing. This is sad, she thinks, this is a sad place to conduct an affair. 

“I thought you might’ve had enough of me,” he says. His voice is clipped but still amused, he sounds like a lawyer. 

“Hello to you, too,” Jeanann replies, turning in the doorway and holding it open just long enough for him to duck inside. The door shuts behind him. 

John follows her as she shuts off the florescent lights, a motion that’s almost second nature. But there’s an uncommon thrill when a warm, heavy hand curls around her hip. The bright hum is cut short, leaving the dining room in half-dark. There’s still a waxy glow from the kitchen and the moon outside.

“I missed you,” he’s already sighing, making her skin erupt in goosebumps. Making her heart go all weak. 

“You’re the one who skipped a visit last Saturday,” she replies, turning to look at him. Her expression’s clearly mocking, a gentle push towards teasing. John tries not to look annoyed with the complaint. 

He doesn’t intent to apologize for any gaps in illicit activity, but he leans in and takes a kiss from the girl. Jeanann lifts her chin, kissing back with a slowness that after-hours can afford. It’s nice in here when there’s no light. She can pretend to be somewhere else, somewhere as sophisticated as him. 

John’s mentioned a city down south, a concrete jungle called Atlanta. He speaks of it with thinly-veiled disgust and an equal amount of homesickness. What’s a lawyer doing in a little county like this? Nothing good, she bets. 

His family’s weird, for sure, but he holds her in way’s she’s only dreamt about. 

Visions of someone like him sweeping her up were a recurring fantasy in high school. Parts of him are a strange divergence, the church is a surprise. But John’s hands are inked and gentle. They find her cheeks, the side of her neck. But he doesn’t squeeze, not yet, not until she asks for it. 

“I have to close the windows,” she says. Trying to push past him is a laugh. John’s built like a brick wall and Jeanann’s not trying very hard to get by. 

He holds her shoulder, steadying her against the wall. But she doesn’t feel trapped, she feels a blush heat her cheeks and she’s grateful for the near-darkness. 

“Why?” He asks, not expecting an answer. His tone isn’t venomous, or dangerous. It’s practiced, purposely seductive. John makes a game out of making her fall over and over again. 

Stay a while, he says without even needing to voice it. That’s exactly what makes her push a little harder. 

“I’m still working,” she insists, “just gimme a minute to close up shop. Then we can—” she giggles, she can’t help it. There’s a promise in her voice that gives him pause. 

John lets her go, stepping back and letting his evening entertainment breeze from his arms. She wasn’t stood up last week, this isn’t what that’s about. Jeanann hardly has anything that belongs to her, nothing that does is quite this much fun. It would be stupid to rush the moment. 

Playing hard to get’s an old game. The window are closed but the curtains aren’t shut, she wants that moonlight to stay a little longer. 

She cuts corners for him and wonders if the man in the tidy suit hanging by the door notices. Probably not. The floor goes unswept, she ignores the dim kitchen light. Part of her debates fiddling with the security cameras pointed at the front of house. It would be smart, but time’s running dry as it is and there’s no real need for it. 

Who’ll look? Who’ll care? Her reputation was sent to coventry, it died of loneliness. 

Jeanann watches John move out of the corner of her eye while she makes her living. He ambles from the light switches by the door to the billboard that’s barely visible. Neon flyers advertise bake sales and the county fair in Helena. He’s bored. 

John exhales slowly when arms encircle his waist for a change. He’s hugged from behind, snugly with an affection that’s decidedly different. Perhaps this is how he’s always liked it, but he never thought to ask for it. 

“You’re being really patient,” she says, her cheek rests against his shoulder blade. John makes a low, quick noise of amusement in his throat. Not quite a laugh, but they could be cousins. 

“Actually, I’m beginning to wonder if I’m wasting my time,” he’s teasing back. Jeanann’s heart jumps to her throat, she gives his middle a fond squeeze. 

“I’m not upset about last week,” she clarifies, “you’re busy, I get it. Can I have another kiss?” 

John’s the one against the wall this time, though not quite as pressed to it as she was. He pries her hands away from his abdomen, he holds them tight as he gives her what she wants. 

The second kiss is headier, heavier with the accompanying sensation of being swallowed alive. John’s not as shy, emboldened by a lengthy wait and burning desire. 

She reminds him of skyscrapers and dirty streets, though the city’s never touched her. Jeanann makes him wonder if he moved an inch from Atlanta, he’s never felt so compelled to give in to old habits. It’s the same thing, even here, but sweeter. Just different enough not to cause alarm, she fills his empty ribcage with the smell of cherry pie and knockoff Chanel no. 5. 

He bites her lip until she opens up, his tongue’s well-received. This is right, this is coping, this is healing. Touch and keep touching, John figures. Keep his body occupied until the danger’s passed. 

Jeanann smooths over the rage without even realizing it. Her hands grip his back so gently, they rub at sore spots she has no way to know exist. He was so caught up in the surprise of her that first time, he almost told Joseph. 

There’s a waitress wearing red stripes at the crummy diner in Henbane River. She’s made of flesh and nerves, of love and wonder as he is. 

But this is their playtime, mutually understood as semi-permanent and deeply satisfying. Jeanann stops holding him, she fumbles with her white demi-apron secured at her front. He’s stills stealing kisses, little pecks and relishing the feel of her smiling mouth on his. 

Her apron’s tossed to the floor, she reaches for his hand and tugs him back towards the line of aluminum tables. They’re short enough for her to lean her rear against. Jeanann braces a hand on either side of her and pushes up until she’s sitting at the edge of the centre table, parting her legs to accommodate him. 

There’s nothing like undoing buttons, in his opinion. Three of them run from her mid-collar, over the curve of her breast and end just above her stomach, John flicks them open with a single motion of his hand. 

His other palm feels the soft skin of Jeanann’s calf. The striped skirt of her uniform is a modest knee-length and quickly ushered up her thigh, pushed haphazardly so John might touch more of her. 

He’s still overdressed but makes no move to rid himself of his finery. A three-piece suit this close to July must be stifling, but Jeanann gets the feeling he’s hiding something underneath his clothes. 

Prying is for girlfriends, and she’s nowhere close to that. Let him keep his secrets, it’s more fun for her. 

“Slow down,” she gasps instead of asking if she can take off his jacket. He might part with it, might not. But softly-said commands are heeded every time. John knows she means them when she’s gentle. 

“You’re right,” it even sounds like a monumental admission, “there’s no rush,” 

John grips her outer thigh, sinking his fingers into giving flesh and urging her legs to wrap around his waist. It’s a fight to remain sitting up, gravity’s calling and lust makes her head spin. 

Jeanann fights the urge to sink into what he makes her feel. She makes a grab for his tie and pulls until it’s a taut but not dangerous. With one hand clutching satin, the other hooks around his shoulder. 

John’s pressed against her in an undeniably intimate way. He’s got a a heartbeat like bird wings, deeply human in how it slams against the inside of his chest. Jeanann kisses his cheek, then his jaw. She moves the collar of his shirt aside as best she can with limited mobility, keeping him close with a tug of his tie. She leaves half a lipstick mark each on his neck and crisp fabric. 

For the first time, John doesn’t care about sullied clothes. He shivers and presses his hips forward. It’s an unexpected but wholly natural reaction to Jeanann catching his skin between her teeth with the intent to leave a mark. 

He doesn’t know what she whispers to him, it’s hard to parse her adoring sighs. But she keeps a hand on his tie, constricting his airflow in a way that’s painfully erotic to him. 

Two can play at that game, but not right away. John’s just as tempted as she to get lost in the sensation, to pitch forward into it and thrust with wild abandon. He allows himself two more forward presses against her before pulling back. 

“I think you’re forgetting who’s in charge,” he says to the night and the dark. Jeanann lets out another laugh, even she’s not sure about how sultry it sounds. 

“Why don’t you remind me, then?” She replies. “Please,” 

Untangling from him is a difficult process. Jeanann departs just enough to admire her handiwork, the little blotch above his collar’ll hang around for a couple days. He’ll have to go out of his way to hide her, isn’t that fun? 

John helps her back, urges her to prop herself up on one hand. Her other arm’s allowed to stay thrown over his shoulder, palm-up. 

His hands are still gentle, mesmerizing with patterns scattered over his knuckles. One leaves her lip, follows the curve of her body up her front and loosely grips around her throat. John feels her fluttering heart under his palm and stares at Jeanann through the near-dark. Her eyes close out of instinct, her lips still in an upward curve. 

He applies a little pressure with his middle finger and thumb, drawing appreciative groans. But he doesn’t tighten his hold too much, John seems most interested in exploring. He looses his hand, running his fingers over her skin until she shivers how he did. 

It’s a reminder she’ll easily discard. That’s what he likes about her. 

John can admire how this girl makes him linger in such a shabby place. But his body has urges that going ignored, he drops his hand from her neck and pushes it more insistently between Jeanann’s open thighs. 

She squeals in delight, a surprising sound he’s never known. This girl is mysterious in her own way, content to sound silly and satisfied all at once. He drags his fingers over the crotch of her cotton panties. 

Her arm leaves his shoulder, she cups his crotch as if to remind him of her eagerness. John’s well aware. 

The first time they made love, Jeanann whispered about a party trick and undid his belt with her left hand. John feels the her do it again, it’s just as distracting. 

As if to reclaim lost territory, he curls his fingers around the leg band of her panties. With the crotch pulled hard to the side, he’s free to explore. 

She’s wet, warm and sighing for him in seconds. John knows the female body, knows where to press and stroke and tease. Jeanann’s legs tightens around his waist, she attacks his fly and pushes her hand in his briefs.

John’s hard, straining against his trousers and all-too willing to be helped from their confines. Her hot, little hand pumping him slowly feels transcendent. 

He circles her clit with his thumb, angling his fingers just right and slipping one inside her. Jeanann gasps, then laughs again. The sound is strangled and indulgent. 

John’s smart as a whip, ready to crack but unwilling to break her. He fingers her, slowly as she asked for. But suddenly, it’s not what she wants. She grips his length, pulls at him, hopes that her insistence will inspire some kind of reaction. 

Jeanann doesn’t want punishment, she wants to swim in the smell of expensive cologne that he carries. She wants to be pushed back, loved hard, fucked while she grips the table. 

And he’ll give it to her. 

But not before he slides a second finger in her, right next to the one already making her lean her head back. If John didn’t know any better, he’d say she was exaggerating. She’s not, she’s full of longing bubbling under the surface. She means this. 

“Come on, come on,” she begs with a crack on the last syllable. John tilts his head to inspect her shut eyes and pleading lips. He kisses the corner of her mouth like he’s hungry. 

“So full of contradictions,” he sounds like he’s enjoying this. It’s the closest to her brand of amusement she’ll get. “You wanted it slow,” 

“I already said please,” Jeanann’s breathless already, huffing and puffing and holding back her happiness. Just for a second, it’ll burst forth like water behind a dam, those countless joys. 

John leans forward, his lips court the curve of her ear. 

“I’d like to hear it again,” he rasps. Her moan sounds like he still has his hand around her throat. 

“Oh, please,” it’s immediate, an end to a game. John can’t say he’s disappointed, she gives it good. 

His hand withdraws and her needy fist enclosing his circumference falls to the wayside. He dips his fingers in his mouth, tasting salt on the bed of his tongue. When he’s clean, he fumbles in his pocket for a condom. 

It crinkles as he tears it with his teeth, spitting foil onto the floor Jeanann neglected to clean in favour of him. He dips the head of his cock inside her this time when he’s ready, pressing slow even when she’s given him what he wanted. 

A quick thrust would hurt. John won’t emulate it, but he likes how she sounds when she laughs. 

Her playful, breathy moan mingles with the sound of wayward cars tearing down the highway outside. This road he travelled to get to her is as unassuming as its destination. 

John grunts when his hips meet hers, gripping Jeanann’s waist so she can lean back how she usually does. 

Her wants change only slightly. Instead of holding on to the table, she surges forward. The dam breaks, her hands are at his shoulders and they skirt over forgotten pains. She thrusts back, every one of John’s meets its twin. 

Pelvises strike like chips of flint, a little messy and slightly painful. They ease into a rhythm once her poorly-contained excitement ebbs into into a sea of comfortably pleasant feelings. 

That common, mindless between ache in John’s legs is satisfied. He’s made the trek back to Atlanta in a fraction of the time. And maybe, he considers, he’s found somewhere better. 

His thumb still circles the little bud of nerves above their joining. Jeanann mewls into his shoulder, hiding her face. John has a clear view of the outside, his getaway car is in the middle of the parking lot. 

John hears her hum and sigh, feels a warmth spread through him. It’s a good feeling, dammit. Shame he has to give it up. The bump and rush of her curved hips against his is too close to a false heaven. 

But this isn’t a bad send-off, he thinks as he rocks inside her. Far from it. She’s pliant, sagging forward in his arms, mumbling curses and his name interchangeably. It’s cute, he likes cute. 

It ends for her rather abruptly, the building sensation reaches its peak. Jeanann’s never been one to hold back a scream of pleasure, it graces John’s ears. 

And he thought she was sagging before. She leans against him, dead weight needing to be held up while he draws closer to his own climax. There’s something solid about this girl, young though she might be. She carries a force and a presence. He won’t tell her, he decides, how difficult it’s going to be forget her. 

He comes, groaning her nickname. John joins her in taking lungfuls of air during the come-down, the edges of reality slightly blurred. 

“That,” Jeanann hums, “was pretty good, baby.” He could laugh, but he doesn’t. She’s the baby, seven years his junior and looking at him with needy eyes

“Well,” John retorts, “you’re easy to impress.”

“Am not,” it’s a mediocre defence. She holds on to him nonetheless until she’s ready to let go. He allows it, never quite sure of he’ll see comfort of its like again. 

He slips from her after a while, tying the condom off. Jeanann’s legs release him from their vicelike grip and he steps away from the table. 

“I gotta finish up here, won’t take a minute,” she rights herself, taking the used condom from him to deposit in the trash. 

She might’ve kissed him properly, if she knew, but he receives only a kiss on the cheek as she walks towards the kitchen. Perhaps she waits in anticipation of how sore she’ll be tomorrow, nothing makes her feel more centred. 

The kitchen light’s turned off, Jeanann’s back in the dining room quick as advertised. But there’s no John waiting in the full-dark. Her brow furrows, she moves around the counter. 

Their first coupling ended in jokes about how long this’ll last. Evidently, not longer than tonight. A scrap of paper on the table she was perched thanks her for her time. And that’s it, his car’s gone and the moon shines brightly through the window. 

Jeanann gives a private little shrug. She’ll feel more than sore tomorrow, there’s little she detests like feeling sorry for herself. John’s a smugger son-of-a-bitch than she initially anticipated, but at least he didn’t leave a tip. 

__

_2018_

John’s slightly unnerved by how well she took to her new role.

He remembers her, even still. He could never scrub the sounds of how happy he made her from the inside of his skull. It felt good to be wanted, needed, capable of creating wonders. 

She’s not some waitress in a shit-hole diner any more, her red hair piled high on her head. John can picture her as she is now, older and crawling from the wreckage of a helicopter. She’s completely alone. 

Junior Deputy Jeanann Leahy knows this valley a little too well, knows where to hide and the best way to evade. There’s no doubt in his mind that she recalls him just as clearly. How she runs from a reunion is more amusing than upsetting. 

He indulged the worst parts of himself with her. He let her push against festering wounds filled with lies and bad memories. And maybe, just maybe, he felt a little more whole when he was inside her.

The thought disgusts him now, the thought of her writhing underneath him is disturbing. 

So he takes it upon himself play with her frayed nerves like a cat pulling on a mouse’s tail. She might be a little tougher, not the same girl, but lesser people have come apart with the slightest pressure. 

When she wanders into his path, it’s only right and fair that he urge her with everything he’s got. John’s arsenal is uniquely stocked with past indiscretions, little secrets shared between the two of them. She won’t stand a chance.

He exploits the direct link to her radio the first chance he gets, his tone dripping with a patronizing malice that’s so unlike the way he used to speak to her. 

“I know you,” he decides it’s the only way to start, nodding towards a shared history. “Your sin is mine. I fed it with you some time ago, unless you’ve forgotten.”

John doesn’t expect a response. With how she flees him, he imagines she doesn’t want to revisit the memories. That suits him fine, he prefers that she remain silent. Penitent. She resists right now, but he figures it’ll end the same way no matter what. Her, face-up and staring at him with a different brand of adoration. Clean.

The static sputters on the other end sputters and runs into itself for less than a minute. Then, it breaks. 

“Hey, baby,” her voice gives way to louder crackles, “you miss me?”

Shit. John grips the mic with a renewed distaste for the woman he hasn’t seen in six years. He shifts in his seat, she sounds distracted. 

The rumble of her stolen truck surrounds her, she’s racing down the highway far from her diner. She’s in a wayward car, tearing up the road and talking to an old flame’s never put her fire out before. He’s no different after all, another bootlicker from a crop of bad seeds. 

“Jeanann,” his voice sounds like an oil slick, easily just as dark, “it’s been a while,”

“Yeah,” she chimes in. She sounds about as old as he pictured, though only half a decade’s elapsed. “It breaks my heart to hear you calling what we had sinful,” 

“I knew it, then, even if you didn’t,” John keeps his composure. People bite back all the time, just like dogs. She’s nothing, unworthy of the rage that presses against his flesh. “Lust is just an urge, easily felt, easily cleansed.” 

“You’re riding my ass pretty hard for something so easy, baby,” she replies. 

“Please,” John scoffs despite himself. His sermon can’t wait a second, but she’s pushed at his desire to speculate. “Your sin isn’t lust, not entirely.” 

“I’m on the edge of my seat here—” the radio cuts off, screams to life again. 

John can hear rapid-fire bullets and the sounds of another car crashing against something solid in the distance. Jeanann’s laughter is so familiar to him that when it fills his room he can almost taste it. 

He’s five years younger, giving in to bad habits that she inspires. He’s ordering slices of pie he wouldn’t eat otherwise just to get her attention. He’s hoping, waiting for her to accept his advances. She does. 

The memories are vivid and jarring, leaving him dazed. She’s talking in the present but he doesn’t hear her right away. 

“Earth to John,” she declares, “I thought we were having a moment.” 

“I haven’t decided what your sin is, deputy,” he snaps with so much vitriol it physically stings her, “I’m reserving my judgement until we properly meet.” 

“Nothing about any meeting we’ve ever had’s been proper, baby,” she reminds him with a scant giggle. But he made her wince, talking to her like that. She’s not getting anywhere near him. “Oh, but it was fun,” 

“You haven’t changed,” he shifts tactics, unsure why he doesn’t cut the connection and bide his time. Jeanann can’t run forever, she couldn’t even leave her hometown. 

“Come on, it was fun,” she continues, “you were pretty good. You used to make me—”

“Stop it,” it’s a growl, the sound of a wild animal communicating danger. It doesn’t hurt nearly as much as when he meant it. 

There’s a pause as she decides if the line’s worth crossing. Fuck it, he’s so dead-set on unsettling her. She keeps her eyes on the road and tries very hard not to let sarcasm interrupt a playful moan. 

Dead silence. 

Jeanann floors it down the stretch of road, turning sharply with the way it curves. She can’t say she’s wholly sad to hear the last of John, but he did frighten her in new ways. 

He wasn’t the sweetest when she knew him, but he was good in his own way. She’s not sure if it’s right to mourn a man she never really understood. 

“You’re mocking me,” he finally rasps into the microphone. Her heart skips a beat. 

“I’m not,” is her firm reply. Thinking for more than a moment would see her change her mind, so Jeanann doesn’t. She turns sharply again, off the road and steers her truck towards the trees. The brakes squeal as stops the vehicle. 

John’s in nearly as dire straits. He sits at a desk, clutching the mic and trying not to make a noise she could misconstrue. But his cock is twitching in his jeans, he wants to hear her again. 

A moan, a laugh, anything. He doesn’t know and he doesn’t care. He’s felt this way so many times, for so many people. But Jeanann makes it feel like it might cleanse him instead. 

The hot press of shame, of failure could be performative. John lays a palm flat against the table and shifts in his seat. 

“You were a damn good fuck, John,” Jeannan says when she gets no immediate response. On the other end, the sound he makes is muffled but he’s clearly still there. 

“Don’t—” he tries again with a more specific word choice. She picks up on what he means sooner than she lets on.

“What? Baby, talk to me—” there it is. The conversation’s shifted to an undeniable familiarity, to dark nights in an old diner with no space between the two of them. 

That’s what Jeanann did, she called him baby. And there were very few things on earth that made him feel how it did. With an audible grunt, John widens the spread of his legs. His palm relocates from atop the desk to over his crotch.

“It’s okay,” she tries. She gets father on the second attempt, “I know you. I used to make you make you want me, I think. I got so close to making you laugh.” 

“Almost,” he grumbles, his voice is darker still. “But you always fell just short.” 

“I could try again,” there’s a pause, “right now,” 

God dammit, this is torture. He wanted to whisper in her ear when he picked up the microphone and put fear it her. He wanted to witness how that fear turned her inside out, easy to cleanse until she was something better. 

John hunches over himself at his desk. Part of himself is full of so much inward hatred, he should just hang up and have Jeanann dragged here kicked and screaming. He’ll see how funny she is underwater.

“Touch yourself,” she sighs, “that’s barely giving in to anything.”

“My sins are in the past,” he defends, but his hand is still curled around the bulge in his jeans. His toes curl in his boots. 

“I thought lust was just as easy to get rid of as it was to feel?” It’s not a real question, but it doesn’t make him see red. Jeanann leans closer to her speaker, she makes a sound that’s almost too enticing. 

John squeezes, letting out a shuddering breath. In her truck in the woods, Jeannan smirks. 

“That’s a start, babe, for sure. But I know you can do better,” she shifts in the front seat, beginning to unbutton her jacket. “Why don’t you ask me what I’m wearing, huh?” 

“Fine, what are you wearing?” John sounds pained, like something’s restricting his air supply. The sound of Jeanann’s crackly giggle makes him throb underneath his hand. 

“In a couple minutes, not a fucking thing,” she lies, only loosening the collar of her shirt. It would be a hell of a fight if anyone found her. And she’s not crazy enough to fight in the nude, not yet. But, the fantasy is important. “Did you ever see me naked, way back when?” 

“Once,” he admits. His voice sounds thick until he clears his throat. John’s chair creaks underneath him. “When we fucked in the break room.” 

“Oh, yeah,” Jeanann remembers it fondly. She sits in her truck, clothed and unwilling to shed much more skin. She could kill someone topless, but it would be asking quite a bit. 

“You made—” John stops himself, catches his traitorous tongue between his teeth. 

“What did I make you feel?” She asks. John makes a sound like a rabid dog at her lack of understanding. His palm moves over the outline of his cock with frustrated desire. 

“You made a wicked thing momentarily beautiful,” he scowls at the wall, drops his eyes away from the radio. “And you were beautiful, then, consumed by sin. But it was paltry, meaningless deviance,” 

“John—” Jeanann wants to talk to him like she did once. Yes, the conversations were brief but he never made her feel like their lovemaking was bookended by sermons. 

“I can save you, let me save you,” she can hear in his voice he’s still doing as he was told. He sounds gripped by hope and agony. 

“Baby,” it worked before. His blinding, mounting rage is cracked again up the middle. She leans back in the driver’s seat. “I got my hand on your cock, can you feel it?” 

John sighs in the speaker, Jeanann takes it as a yes. He feels nothing like her, but when he closes his eyes it’s not half bad. 

“Go slow, okay? Like I would,” his laugh’s like quiet thunder, it pitches and rolls in his chest to the point where she nearly mistakes it for more static. 

“You would not,” he exhales out of his nose. The noise is foreign and strange to the both of them. “You’d pull like you were trying to flay me alive.” 

“You have some nerve,” Jeannan’s laughing too, before she can help herself. She’s pulling John with her back to a time when things were less black-and-white. “I wasn’t that awful at it,”

“No, you weren’t,” he sounds like he’s waiting to give a confession. He moves his hand slowly over his fly, but doesn’t venture further. “You were young,” 

“I think I could surprise you, now,” she continues, “go a little faster.” John complies, reaching further down to grip the curve of his balls. He lets out a throaty groan. 

She feels a bit spoiled by all these reactions. John was a warm, stone wall when she knew him best. Easier to pacify, maybe, but not exactly the most emotional of souls. He feels more dangerous now, but exposed and unstable. When prodded in just the right way, he could be capable of devastating anger. Or powerful love. 

“How does it feel?” She asks, her voice is air-light. She sounds closer to him, now that he’s not staring at the box from which her voice spills. “How do I feel?”

Her face swims in dark behind his eyelids, as he knew her five years ago. She had a pretty pout, enough ginger hair to thread his fingers through and pull on. Her body was freckle-dusted and imperfect, she had nothing but confidence in it either way. 

“Soft,” he decides, “you had the softest skin I’d ever touched,” 

Jeannan sits in her truck, her body’s surely ignited by the sound of his debauchry. But touching herself, despite his lust-choked voice feels wrong. She might not have changed, he might even be right about that. But the river gave back a different man. Or maybe more unwilling to hide how twisted he was underneath. 

It’s her turn, she realizes as he groans and grunts. 

“Undo your belt, baby,” she says, “unzip your fly. How hard are you?” 

“It was starting to hurt,” he replies with another mirthful exhale. At one point in her life, Jeanann would’ve lived and died for the sound of his joy. 

“And now?” She pushes at the wound leaking blood, hopefully in the right spot. 

“You’re a Jezebel,” John states, sounding slippery. He’s enticing, sure, but it’s not her resolve that’s in question.

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” she teases. John sets his teeth on edge tempted to growl something loving or cutting into the microphone. He can’t decide which. 

He rubs himself with a languid abandon. Any sort of indulgence is form of abandonment at this point. He’s ready to experience an afterglow with a hollow centre. Nothing feels as good as the collapse into the arms of a lover after a heated exchange. 

John shoves the thought that he’s alone to the side. He’s not. Jeanann’s with him, just like before. She’ll come to him after this, with no fuss. He’s sure. What did he need to learn more than how to give? This is a small price to pay for her loyalty. 

And in the back of John’s mind thrives the potential for more indiscretion with her. The thought pushes against his imagination with a little more force, it becomes clearer. He can see it, feel it, taste it. Things he found pointless and ridiculous feel more tempting than ever. John would like to have her back.

Jeanann pictures his hands, rougher from murder and terrible acts moving up and down the length of his cock. Maybe he has more tattoos, now, new places to kiss that she’ll never get to explore. 

“Jeanann,” he sounds weak all of a sudden, close. It really has been a while, hasn’t it? “Jeanie—”

“I got you,” the rumble of the engine still surrounds her. She’s stayed in one place to long, made herself a target for the Baptist. “Come, I know you want to.” 

She reaches forward, grips the knob of the gear stick and shifts the truck into reverse. Jeanann backs out towards the road again, slower this time. She listens to him carry on through what sounds like a very pleasurable orgasm. 

It’s unclear what’s worse, that she’s not there or that she wishes she was. Both are unpalatable upon greater thought.

John sits, twitching in his chair. He’s slumped over, his hand still loosely wrapped around the base of his fading erection. 

“I’ll see you soon,” he doesn’t have it in himself to give her the option to again refuse. She must come to him. “We can confess together, there’s a lot to talk about.” 

There’s no answer, not even when he says her name again. She’s one of the hummingbirds, flying far and fast from where he roosts.


End file.
